Scramble
Copyright© 2025 by Lumpy
Chapter 24
Monday, I hobbled across the parking lot toward the track for my early morning practice on a pair of aluminum crutches loaned to me by the training department.
The whole thing after the track meet had been a shit show. I couldn’t walk home, obviously, and neither Mom nor Dad was available to pick me up. Coach Greer had to deal with the rest of the meet, since we were hosting, he couldn’t just leave, so I’d ended up calling Coach Holloway.
He was pissed I’d run in the meet, and he and Coach Greer had a really intense conversation that I hoped wouldn’t blow back on me. Apparently, he’d called the trainers as soon as he saw me because shortly after that, our lead trainer showed up and took me into the training room to look me over.
It had been a whole thing, and honestly, I hoped it would have just blown over by today.
Unfortunately, that didn’t seem likely since, when I hobbled toward the track, I realized that it wasn’t just Eduardo waiting for me. He was standing with Jason and Sean, and the three were talking.
I honestly didn’t know either one of them. Sean, I had one class with, but we never really talked, and didn’t interact much during track. Jason was a sophomore, and we interacted even less.
“Holy crap,” Jason blurted out when he saw me, causing the other two to look toward me. “Is it broken? Are you done for the season?”
They’d been around when Coach Holloway had shown up, and I was taken into the school, but the trainer took forever, and basically everyone was gone by the time we finished.
“Did the trainers say anything about surgery?” Sean asked. “My brother tore his ACL, and he was out for like eight months and...”
“It’s fine. Nothing serious,” I said. “It’s just a pulled muscle. Coach Holloway and the trainers are being super careful and making me use these things for a week to keep weight off it.”
“You sure you should be out here? Why’d you even walk here?” Eduardo asked.
“I’m fine. The walk-in was a bitch, but other than that, it’s all just being careful. I can’t run or do anything physical with my legs, but I can still run the practice,” I said, and then looked to Sean and Jason. “What are you two doing here?”
“We were kind of hoping we could join in. We’ve all seen how Eddie’s times have dropped over the past month. Plus, Coach Greer keeps talking about the extra work he’s been putting in,” Jason said.
“They asked me after the meet on Saturday and I told them they could come check it out. I didn’t think you’d mind,” Eduardo said before looking back to Jason. “These practices really have helped a lot.”
“So what exactly do you guys do in these sessions? How do you know what drills to run? Is it really making that much difference? Because I’ve been reading about interval training and lactate threshold work and...” Sean started, launching into a mountain of questions.
“Stop,” I cut him off. “I’m happy to help anyone I can, and that right there is one of your problems.”
Sean’s mouth hung open mid-sentence.
“Every time Coach Greer is trying to give you pointers, instead of trying to implement them you ask a million questions and try to overanalyze everything. By the time you get around to actually working on the changes, you’ve confused the hell out of yourself and lost everything he’s trying to teach you.”
Jason elbowed Sean in the ribs. “Yeah, just shut up and listen for once.”
I hadn’t realized the two of them were friends, but clearly there was some kind of ongoing joke between them.
“It’s like this,” I continued, propping myself more securely against the bleacher railing. “These aren’t fun morning jogs and just some easy workouts. We push ourselves ... every day. It’s the only way you’re going to improve. This is serious work that means dragging yourselves out of bed at five-thirty every morning, even when it’s cold or you’re sore from yesterday’s practice. You need to be here at six AM every day. If it’s raining, the janitor lets us use the gym to practice inside.”
They both looked impressed I’d managed to arrange something like that. I didn’t mention that I’d had to go to Coach Holloway to arrange the gym access because track just didn’t have that kind of pull. In West Texas, football ruled, and they were the ones who could make exceptions happen. Track coaches had to work around everyone else’s schedule.
“No, I get it,” Jason said, holding up his hands defensively. “I’m good with whatever it takes to get better. I’m sick of being inconsistent in my races. I start strong then die in the last hundred meters every single time.”
“That’s one of the things we’ll work on,” I nodded. “Building the conditioning to maintain speed through the whole race.”
“I just want to stop being the weakest link on the relay,” Sean added. “Maybe even have the smallest shot at winning an individual race or two.”
“Both are possible if you commit to doing the work,” I said. “Are you really sure about this? I want you to be clear about what you’re signing up for because once we start, I won’t let you quit just because it gets hard. And if you do quit, you can’t come back.”
I was kind of cribbing the speech Coach Moreno had given me when he’d first started working with me, although with a lot fewer curses. I figured if I was going to work on my leadership, I could take lessons from him on that, too.
Even if some of those lessons were on what not to do.
“I’m sure,” Jason said, straightening up. “Ted and Cody keep ragging on me about being a drag on the team. I want to prove I can be serious about track.”
“Me too. My dad ran for Oklahoma University,” Sean added. “He wants me to do the same, and I think he’s kind of losing faith in me. I need to show him I can do it.”
I decided to test their commitment right away. “If you’re serious, you need to prove it by doing today’s workout even though you didn’t prepare for it. I’m warning you, it won’t be easy, and you’ll probably feel like dying halfway through.”
“Bring it on,” Jason said immediately.
Sean looked nervous but nodded.
“You asked for this,” Eduardo told them. “Better not embarrass me after I vouched for you.”
“Since I can’t demonstrate anything on these crutches, you’ll have to listen carefully and trust what I say about form and pacing. I’ll use Eduardo as my test dummy,” I said, slapping Eduardo on the shoulder, adjusting my grip on the crutches. “I’ve learned a lot about running mechanics from football and from working with Coach Greer.”
“You sure you know enough to help us?” Jason asked.
“Maybe, but even if I don’t, these extra workouts will get you stronger regardless.”
“Don’t listen to him,” Eduardo interrupted. “Blake hates to make promises, but you only have to look at how I’ve improved to see what he can do.”
Sean started to open his mouth with another question but stopped himself when I gave him the look.
“Good. You’re learning already.” I pointed toward the track with one of my crutches. “Let’s get started.”
The following Monday, I begged off of QB practice, so that Eduardo and I could make it to Li’s house by six. I hadn’t been sure I’d be able to talk Coach Holloway into letting me out of it, so I was a little surprised when he agreed.
Admittedly, it had been weeks since Coach Moreno’s last visit, and he was coming back on Wednesday, so Coach figured it was okay to give me a day off.
Also, I had a good excuse.
It was Li’s birthday, and her mom was having a party tonight. She even had family coming in from Dallas and Houston to celebrate. It seemed a little crazy to me, but she was the oldest of all the cousins in the US, so I guess that made her birthday a big deal.
Whatever the reason, Coach took pity on me. I still had seven-on-seven practice though, so Eduardo headed home, took a shower and changed while I was doing that, and was waiting for me when I came out of the field house, after I’d taken a quick shower.
He was dressed up. Well, not like going to church dressed up, but he’d put on his ‘nice’ clothes. That, and how he’d acted the other day when I teased him, pinged something in my head.
Maybe it was just ‘cause this was his first girlfriend, but getting all dressed up for another girl, even one who was a friend, could be read as bad. I didn’t want him to have trouble because of it.
“Hey, did you ask Li if it was okay for you to bring your girlfriend with you?” I asked.
He didn’t say anything, and kind of looked away from me back to the football field instead.
“What happened?” I asked.
“We broke up.”
“When?”
They’d been sitting next to each other at lunch earlier in the day and seemed fine. No hint of a breakup, so it was something of a surprise.
“This afternoon,” he said.
I was shocked he didn’t sound more torn up. Even with how weird things were between me and Melanie, I don’t think I would be nearly as calm as he was being if we broke up.
“Damn, man, I’m really sorry. Did she say why she wanted to end it?”
“Actually, I broke up with her.”
That made me actually stop in my tracks and stare at him open-mouthed. I would have bet a million dollars it was the other way around. Sarah was sweet, gorgeous, and seemed to really like him.
Why in the world did he break up with her?
“Why?”
“I don’t know, it just wasn’t working out. I just didn’t feel it. Could we just drop it?”
I gave him a skeptical look but said, “Yeah. Sure.”